The Parable of One Thing

If you are familiar with bible, you would have heard the story of two sisters- Martha and Mary, who had an important guest-Jesus. They were ecstatic at the presence of Jesus, the latest celebrity that trends on the media daily. He was such a charismatic person that pulls crowd everywhere He goes. Crowd control is always an issue at His events; everyone wants to catch a glimpse or even touch. Influential people in the city want to host Him and hear Him say the mystical things He teaches.

It was this kind of person that chose to visit a family that does not have an affluence attached to their robes so they were completely blown away by His presence. The elder sister, Martha, could not handle her excitement. She wanted everything to be perfect for her guest, so she looked over everything from the lawn, settee, air conditioner. She couldn’t bear the thought of the chef ruining the day, so she added chef supervision to her role for the afternoon. She was everywhere!

As she did this, her sister, Mary, simply sat down with their revered guest and was just chatting and chuckling all along. Soon, Martha became weary and needed an assistant supervisor. Mary was the only option. She called out to her, but Mary would not take up the role. She simply wanted to entertain her guest. Martha busted into the room to report her sister to their guest, but she got a rebuke instead. Many talk about Martha’s error today as being cooking food. That’s not true. Her error was that she neglected the one thing that is important.

Martha’s case is the refection of many young people today. The youthful stage of the life of man is filled with decisions; decisions that have a long lasting impact on what the life will eventually look like. It is important to understand this crucial season and maximize it.

Life is beyond the present, so you should understand the place of making the right call. The quest for survival hits you hard at this stage and in a bid to escape from the horrors of poverty, especially if you are from a middle class or lower class family, we tend to chase many things, hoping that one of it will click. However, from my observation, I have discovered that those who set their hearts on one thing eventually come out better than those who chase many things.

The brain seems to be wired in a different manner from what is popular. When you lay your hands on many things, you are celebrated for your ability to multitask, but impact doesn’t come from width, but depth. When you put your hands into many things, you come out shallow in all. This is the case with many young people trying to get a life out of any kind of job.

A career is a long journey that I often advice should start from campus. (It’s fine if you didn’t start from campus though.) When you choose a path and you dig it as much as you can, you’re developing capacity to rise to the top of that career already. Every career is like a pyramid; the higher you go, the fewer you find. At the top of every career is a person who focused on one thing.

There has been an age long battle between multitasking and efficiency. Multitasking helps you to build capacity; you’re able to handle many things and this is a life skill that you must not overlook. However, in your career pursuit, you need to develop efficiency more than multitasking. Efficiency helps you to innovate and this gives you a competitive edge in your field. Multitasking helps you to do it well while efficiency helps you to do it brilliantly and inventively and this is what you need to rise in your field.

Focusing on one thing can look unrealistic due to economic matters, but there is always a price for growth. On the long run, depth pays more than width. Building a career is better than merely securing a job. Jobs should be like the rungs of your career ladder. Just like certifications and skills. Many have abandoned their career pursuits for selling of clothes, shoes and bags. While it’s not bad to have businesses where you can make money, you should however, not abandon your development in your chosen career. Don’t be pressured by the situations around you to dropping your career pursuit.

So, what is the one thing you are pursuing? What are you building?